Archinect - News

Cornell AAP reappoints Dean J. Meejin Yoon for a second term

2022-11-18T11:49:00-05:00

Cornell’s College of Architecture, Art and Planning (AAP) Dean J. Meejin Yoon has been reappointed to her post for a second term after a vote from the university’s Board of Trustees in October.

Yoon will begin her second term in January of 2024, extending for five years a tenure that brought “dramatic institutional change” to the campus, according to Provost Michael I. Kotlikoff, who made the announcement yesterday.

Yoon has been credited with doubling the college’s endowment in the process of funding the establishment of several influential centers and recruiting more than a third of its tenured faculty.

Her time as Dean also included the founding of the AAP’s first Office of Diversity and Inclusion, in addition to creating grant opportunities and other academic programs geared specif...

Peter Marino looks back on some harsh influences and early lessons

2022-06-29T11:59:00-04:00

Marino spoke to artist Rashid Johnson for Interview at length about his early client, the magazine's founder Andy Warhol, as well as a host of other topics, including his art collection, time at Cornell, and what he sees as the gradual evolution of pop art’s influence into the works of contemporaries like Michael Graves.

“I think some of Graves’s work is very good, but as an architectural movement, it’s very mannerist. It’s one person’s interpretation. Pop art shaded him, and I was always a bit terrified of the postmodern movement. I thought Venturi, Scott Brown [and Associates] did good work, but I think it’s fair to describe it as a niche section in the field.”

Previously on Archinect: Check out these quotes from Peter Marino's '60 Minutes' episode

The famed retail designer also recalled his early days in the offices of Nelson and SOM, reacting to changes in the city’s architectural palette that he found aberrant and blamed squarely on dramatic post-war shifts in design education ...

Get Lectured: Cornell, Spring '20

2020-02-14T14:21:00-05:00

Archinect's Architecture School Lecture Guide for Winter/Spring 2020

A new school term means it's time for Archinect's latest edition of Get Lectured, an ongoing series where we feature a school's lecture series—and their snazzy posters—for the current term. Check back regularly to keep track of any upcoming lectures you don't want to miss.

Want to share your school's lecture series? Send us your school's lecture series poster and details to connect@archinect.com.

Cornell AAP's event series is jampacked for Spring 2020, featuring lectures from individuals who have a range of professional, teaching, and research interests significant to the study and practice of architecture. A few upcoming speakers this semester include Andrew Kudless, Momoyo Kaijima, Amale Andraos, Florian Idenburg, Brandon Clifford and Wes McGee, David Adjaye, and many more, which you can check out below.

Poster design: Common Name.

Check out previous posters on the Get Lectured Pinterest page!

Want another way t...

Cornell AAP's "Earth: Projections 50 Years after Earth Art" celebrated the work of land artists

2019-11-15T11:55:00-05:00

The symposium was a part of the Preston H. Thomas Memorial Lecture series at the Department of Architecture at Cornell University. It marked the 50th anniversary of the 1969 Earth Art exhibition held in what was then the Andrew Dickson White Museum of Art in Ithaca.

As a nod to the 1969 event, this year's symposium sought to look at the "significance for art, architecture, and design in the contemporary situation defined by planetary issues of environmental crises." The event featured works by land and environmental artists and explored the motivations of their work and its context in history.

Four lectures were given at the symposium, the speakers included:

Peg Rawes, professor of architecture and philosophy, The Bartlett School of Architecture University College London
James Nisbet, associate professor of art history and visual studies, University of California–Irvine
Rania Ghosn of Design Earth and associate professor of architecture and urbanism at MIT
Jorge Otero-Pailos (B.Arch. '...

Ladies in the room: With women at the helm of several architecture schools in the U.S., where does gender disparity go from here?

2019-07-16T10:50:00-04:00

People often ask me if that’s the reason women don’t go into architecture or leave architecture, but I don’t think so. I don’t think there’s one single reason. I think for decades it has been a combination of lots of little reasons - being the only woman in the room, not being respected on construction sites, and add into that working hours, balanced with wanting to be a parent, all those things together have discouraged women. But I do see it changing.

In 2019, the rise of female leadership and representation in architectural academia has become more apparent then ever. In practice and academia, women have risen to position themselves amongst a male-dominated profession. Yale has Deborah Berke, Cornell has Meejin Yoon, Columbia has Amale Andraos, Princeton has Mónica Ponce de León, Harvard has the newly appointed Sarah Whiting, and recently Pratt Institute has announced the deanship of Dr. Harriet Harriss.

With the following institutions showcasing women leading the charge, what exactly does this mean for increasing equity and representation to the profession? In a recent interview, Deborah Berke chats with Forbes about what needs to happen in order for gender disparity to dwindle.

During her interview with Heather Senison, Berke talks numbers and shares why women have turned away from the profession. When asked about architecture schools and if institutions need to do a better job at attracting female leadership and students, Be...

Faculty members from Cornell's architecture department develop virtual reality program for popular video game company Epic Games

2019-06-27T13:56:00-04:00

Faculty in the Department of Architecture have received a cash gift from Epic Games Inc. in support of their work on Virtual Places, a project that is adapting the company's virtual reality (VR) gaming engine, Unreal Engine 4 (UE4), for architectural and urban design.

Three Cornell professors used virtual reality to create and expand on their research project Virtual Places. The study of architecture and video games is a growing focus. Within academia and practice, VR is a tool which helps unpack architectural ideas for learning as well as creating visualization possibilities for clients. Epic Games Inc., a video game and software development company known for creating the popular online game Fortnite, selected Professor Henry Richardson, Assistant Professor Timur Dogan, and Assistant Professor of the Practice Martin Miller as winners of a cash prize out of a pool of invited finalists for the international competition.

Image of Rockerfeller Center - taken from Virtual Places: Real Time Experiential Design and Visualization of Urban Spaces. Image courtesy of Cornell AAP

According to Richardson, "Virtual Places was launched this spring with a research seminar called Gaming Architecture. Both upper-class undergraduates and graduate students 'stress t...

J. Meejin Yoon named Cornell's next AAP Dean

2018-07-24T13:04:00-04:00

American architect J. Meejin Yoon, founding principal of the Boston-based firm Höweler + Yoon (with partner Eric Höweler) and currently head of the architecture department at MIT's School of Architecture and Planning, has been appointed as the next Dean of the College of Architecture, Art and Planning at Cornell University.

Yoon, herself an AAP alumna (B.Arch. '95), will commence her five-year term as the Gale and Ira Drukier Dean on January 1, 2019. She will be succeeding Kent Kleinman, AAP Dean from 2008 to 2018, and the current interim Dean, Kieran Donaghy.

In a statement published today, AAP praised Yoon for her achievements as department head at MIT and her experience as practitioner:

Yoon's current research interests include the role of technology in contemporary design culture, the instrumentality of design in the public realm, and the social and environmental responsibility of the built environment.

She has been teaching at MIT since 2001, beginning as an assistant professo...

Cornell AAP, Sotheby's, Pritzker Prize respond to their ties with Richard Meier, following sexual harassment allegations

2018-03-14T13:51:00-04:00

Following the allegations of sexual harassment by Richard Meier reported in The New York Times yesterday, the Cornell University College of Architecture, Art, and Planning declined Meier's new gift to name the chair of the Department of Architecture, and has cancelled the event planned next week to celebrate the gift.

“As one of our most well-known alumni, Richard Meier has been associated with Cornell University and the College of Architecture, Art, and Planning through his gifts that support students and faculty. Although he has apologized, the reported behavior is unacceptable,” Cornell AAP Dean Kent Kleinman said in a statement yesterday. “We will swiftly explore what additional actions are appropriate with regard to endowments for professorships and scholarships previously donated to Cornell.”

Additionally, Sotheby's Auction House promptly closed a solo exhibition of Meier's work at its S2 Gallery in New York that was supposed to run through March 29, ARTnews first reported. S...

Cornell Architecture Chair named after AAP alumnus Richard Meier

2018-01-29T13:15:00-05:00

The chair of the Department of Architecture in AAP will bear the name of one of the college's renowned alumni: Richard Meier (B.Arch. '56). The Richard Meier Chair of the Department of Architecture was announced by the college and by Richard Meier & Partners Architects, Meier's New York City– and Los Angeles–based practice for 55 years.

The first person to hold the new title of Richard Meier Chair of the Department of Architecture will be AAP associate professor Andrea Simitch (B.Arch. '79).

The 83-year-old Meier is the only Cornell alumnus to have received the Pritzker Architecture Prize (1984).

Morphosis' new Bloomberg Center at Cornell Tech campus now open

2017-09-13T19:58:00-04:00

Morphosis' Emma and Georgina Bloomberg Center in Roosevelt Island, New York has officially opened its doors. Designed as Cornell Tech's “home base”, the academic building was named in honor of Emma and Georgina Bloomberg, in recognition of a $100 million gift from former New York mayor Michael Bloomberg.

With Thom Mayne as design director and Morphosis principal Ung-Joo Scott Lee as project principal, the 4-story, 160,000 sq.ft. educational hub provides traditional classrooms and large workspaces as well as clusters of “break-out” spaces, huddle rooms, and social areas for group study sessions. Students can also use the quiet rooms and micro-pods for working privately or as telephone booths.

Interior. Photo: Matthew Carbone for Morphosis.

Ground floor. Photo: Matthew Carbone for Morphosis.

Aiming to be New York's first net-zero university building, the non-fossil fuel Bloomberg Center is equipped with multiple sustainable features, such as a 40,000 sq.ft. solar canopy that supports 1...

Snøhetta releases new images of its Graduate Hotel for the Cornell Tech campus on Roosevelt Island

2017-03-15T12:26:00-04:00

Cornell Tech has unveiled new details about its planned Graduate Hotel on its new Roosevelt Island campus. Developed by AJ Capital Partners, the hotel will offer 196 rooms alongside a restaurant, rooftop bar, and 5,200 square feet of flexible event space.

The hotel, which is designed by Snøhetta, will feature a “comfortable residential aesthetic” in line with its projected clientele—the families of students and visiting faculty. It will be located at the center of campus. The hotel is slated to open in 2019, while the rest of the three-phase campus masterplan isn’t expected to finish development until the early 2040’s.

Cornell Tech to build world's first Passive House high-rise on NY's Roosevelt Island

2015-06-12T18:20:00-04:00

Construction is slated to start this month on what-will-be the world's first high-rise residential tower built according to Passive House (PH) standards, considered the most rigorous criteria for reducing a building's greenhouse gas emissions. Passive houses, such as the building on the right in the thermogram below, release significantly less heat compared with a typical building (such as that on the left).

Touted as an "iconic marker" for Cornell University's new tech campus on Roosevelt Island in New York's East River, the project will innovative design features such as:

A pre-fabricated metal façade that will act like a thermal blanket, insulating the structure.
A louver system, or the building's "gills," which will house the building's heating and cooling systems.
Low-VOC paint to limit off-gassing and improve air quality.
Exterior paint that "naturally shifts color from silver to warm champagne" when reflecting light.

According to figures released by the university, the building wil...

Pei Cobb Freed faces lawsuit from Cornell over "faulty" Johnson Museum expansion scheme

2015-05-07T14:45:00-04:00

Cornell alleges that the firm Pei Cobb Freed & Partners committed 'architectural malpractice' in its plans for the new wing of the museum, leading to structural deficiencies, cavities in the roof, cracks in the ceiling and other problems. The university says it has suffered 'at least' $1.1 million in damages as a result of the flawed designs. Pei, who also designed the original museum in 1968, was hired by the university to build the addition in 2006.

Editor's Picks #338

2013-10-22T11:45:00-04:00

Michael Abrahamson currently a doctoral student in Architecture History and Theory at the University of Michigan provided a review of "Air Rights" – an exhibition by the Drone Research Lab (DRL) at the Taubman College of Architecture and Urban Planning...Responding either to the author or to projects found in the exhibition (perhaps both?), Darkman criticized "The BLDGBLOG type inquiry walks a fine line between futurism and self-indulgance"

For the latest edition of the In Focus series, dedicated to profiling the photographers who help make the work of architects look that much better, Archinect spoke with Stockholm-based English photographer Robin Hayes.

Plus, Michael Abrahamson currently a doctoral student in Architecture History and Theory at the University of Michigan provided a review of "Air Rights" – an exhibition by the Drone Research Lab (DRL) at the Taubman College of Architecture and Urban Planning. Therein he explains "The exhibit seems to argue that the site of misbehavior and appropriation is shifting from the tagged surfaces of graffiti to aberrant spatial practices of collection and documentation...The show is a mixed bag, displaying everything from a metaphoric play on US intelligence procedures to a pragmatic consumer drone kit. Notably absent is any attempt at using drones for the fabrication of habitable spaces".

Responding either to the author or to projects found in the exhibition (per...

The Nocturnal Face of Architecture: AWP's "Vers un climat" exhibit opens this month

2013-08-07T19:37:00-04:00

Cities can transform into an entirely new place once it's nighttime, sometimes to the point of disorientation that you wonder if you're still in the same city. The upcoming "Vers un climat: Building (With) The Unstable" exhibit at Cornell University presented by award-winning interdisciplinary practice AWP explores the alluring atmosphere of the urban nightscape to illustrate how structures can evolve, change, and perform as active participants in our cities.

"Vers un climat" is based on years of in-depth research by AWP founders Marc Armengaud, Matthias Armengaud, and Alessandra Cianchetta, who continuously explore how intangible elements like climate, time, and light affect architectural design.

The exhibit will showcase AWP's realized and proposed designs that convey the practice's recurring themes of impermanence, evolution, and the uncontrollable. Featured projects include The Lantern Pavilion in Norway, the Troll installation pieces, the LAM Museum sculpture park, a...

Cornell Unveils New NYC Tech Campus by SOM and Morphosis

2012-10-15T11:55:00-04:00

“Google didn’t exist 25 years ago, Facebook didn’t exist 25 years ago, even AOL didn’t exist 25 years ago,” Cornell's Andrew Winters said recently. “The challenge is how do you create a tech campus today that is still flexible enough to grow and evolve for the next 25 years?”

Cornell unveiled its plans for a brand new 12.5-acre tech campus on Roosevelt Island today. The master plan is by SOM and Field Operations, the first academic building is by Thom Mayne and includes a giant two-acre solar array meant to help the structure achieve net-zero energy consumption.

Morphosis to Design First CornellNYC Tech Building on Roosevelt Island

2012-05-09T12:21:00-04:00

Thom Mayne of Morphosis Architects beat out some serious competition yesterday when he was awarded the honor to design the first CornellNYC Tech academic building on Roosevelt Island. The six candidates included Diller Scofidio + Renfro of High Line fame; One World Trade Center designers Skidmore, Owings & Merrill (SOM), and Steven Holl Architects.

Six Stellar Firms Tapped for Cornell's NYC Tech Campus

2012-02-28T18:12:00-05:00

The innovation offered by a new tech campus on Roosevelt Island is not limited to New York’s technology sector but the design one, as well. Almost every bid had soaring renderings and flashy flythroughs, most notably the winning entry from Cornell. Now the upstate university has announced six of the world’s top firms, including a few local favorites, are in the running to design the new tech campus.

Making the shortlist are SOM, OMA, Morphosis, Diller Scofidio + Renfro, Steven Holl and the dark horse Bohlin Cywinski Jackson, which maybe makes sense if they're looking to mind Apple engineers.

Stanford and Cornell Offer Novel Environmental Plans for N.Y.C. Campus

2011-10-24T19:05:00-04:00

If Cornell University were to win the city’s competition to build a new science graduate school, it would install on Roosevelt Island almost four acres of solar panels, 500 geothermal wells, and buildings with the rare distinction of generating as much power as they use.

First Look: Rem Koolhaas' Architecture For Architects At Cornell University

2011-09-14T20:47:00-04:00

It's not entirely finished yet, and it's been under the radar in terms of press coverage. But Rem Koolhaas' new Milstein Hall, tucked behind the Arts Quad at Cornell University, has opened for the new school year, providing much-needed studio space and meeting areas for students in Cornell University's architecture program.

Cornell's Milstein Hall by OMA Opened

2011-08-24T20:01:00-04:00

Architecture students cross the Arts Quad and see the new studio space in Milstein Hall for the first time. Milstein Hall, designed by the Office for Metropolitan Architecture, is the first new building for the Cornell University college of Architecture, Art, and Planning in more than 100 years.

flickr, timelapse, previously @ elseplace